Bede: On the Nature of Things and On Times (Translated Texts for Historians LUP)

Translated with introduction, notes and commentary by Calvin B. Kendall and Faith Wallis. The Venerable Bede composed "On the Nature of Things" ("De natura rerum") and "On Times" ("De temporibus") at the outset of his career, about AD 703. Bede fashioned himself as a teacher to his people and his age, and these two short works show him selecting, editing, and clarifying a mass of difficult and sometimes dangerous material. He insisted that his reader understand the mathematical and physical basis of time, and though he was dependent on his textual sources, he also included observations of his own. But Bede was also a Christian exegete who thought deeply and earnestly about how salvation-history connected to natural history and the history of the peoples of the earth. To comprehend his religious mentality, we have to take on board his views on science - and vice versa. "On the Nature of Things" is a survey of cosmology. Starting with Creation and the universe as a whole, Bede reads the cosmos downwards from the heavens, through the atmosphere, to the oceans and rivers of earth. This order (recapitulating the four elements or fire, air, water and earth) was derived from his main source, Isidore of Seville's "On the Nature of Things". However, Bede separated out Isidore's chapters on time, and dealt with them in "On Times". "On Times", like its second, revised and enlarged edition "The Reckoning of Time" ("De temporum ratione"), works upwards from the smallest units of time, through the day and night, the week, month and year, to the world-ages. Bede's innovation is to introduce a practical manual of Easter reckoning, or computus, into this survey. Hidden beneath the matter-of-fact surface of the work is an intense polemic about the correct principles for determining the date of Easter - principles which in Bede's view are bound up with both the integrity of nature as God's creation, and the theological significance of Christ's death and resurrection. In these works Bede re-united cosmology and time-reckoning to form a unified science of computus that would become the framework for Carolingian and Scholastic basic scientific education. Illustrations x Acknowledgements xi Abbreviations xiii Introduction Date and Purpose of On the Nature of Things (ONT) and On Times (OT) 1 Structure and Content of ONT and OT 3 Unity of Conception of ONT and OT 4 The Place of ONT and OT in Bede's Thought 6 Bede's Template: Isidore of Seville's "De natura rerum" (DNR) 7 Bede's Transformation of Isidore's DNR 12 Bede's Attitude Toward Isidore 13 The Easter Controversy and the Pedagogy of Computus 20 The Christian World-Chronicle 25 Bede's Science: Continuities and New Directions 30 The Transmission of ONT and OT 33 The Reception of ONT and OT: Glosses and Excerpts 37 Principles Governing this Translation 42 Inventory of Manuscripts and Editions of Bede's ONT and OT 43 Bede: "On the Nature of Things" A Poem of Bede the Priest 71 The Chapters of On the Nature of Things 72 1. The Fourfold Work of God 74 2. The Formation of the World 74 3. What the World Is 75 4. The Elements 75 5. The Firmament 76 6. The Varied Height of Heaven 77 7. Upper Heaven 77 8. The Heavenly Waters 77 9. The Five Circles of the World 78 10. The Regions of the World 79 11. The Stars 80 12. The Course of the Planets 80 13. Their Order 81 14. Their Orbits 82 15. Why Their Colours Change 83 16. The Circle of the Zodiac 83 17. The Twelve Signs 84 18. The Milky Way 84 19. The Course and Size of the Sun 85 20. The Nature and Place of the Moon 85 21. Method for Determining the Course of the Moon through the Signs of the Zodiac 86 22. The Eclipse of the Sun and the Moon 87 23. Where there Is No Eclipse and Why 88 24. Comets 89 25. The Air 89 26. The Winds 90 27. The Order of the Winds 90 28. Thunder 91 29. Lightning 91 30. Where Lightning Is Not and Why 92 31. The Rainbow 92 32. Clouds 92 33. Rains 93 34. Hail 93 35. Snow 93 36. Signs of Storms or Fair Weather 93 37. Pestilence 94 38. On the Dual Nature of the Waters 94 39. The Ocean's Tide 95 40. Why the Sea Does Not Grow in Size 95 41. Why It Is Bitter 96 42. The Red Sea 96 43. The Nile 96 44. That the Earth Is Bound by Waters 97 45. The Position of the Earth 97 46. That the Earth Is Like a Globe 97 47. The Circles of the Earth 98 48. More on the Same Subject: the Art of Using Sundials 101 49. Earthquake 101 50. The Fire of Mount Etna 102 51. The Division of the Earth 102 Bede: "On Times" The Chapters of On Times 106 1. Moments and Hours 107 2. The Day 107 3. The Night 108 4. The Week 108 5. The Month 109 6. The Months of the Romans 109 7. Solstice and Equinox 110 8. The Seasons 111 9. Years 112 10. The Leap-Year Day 112 11. The Nineteen-Year Cycle 113 12. The "Leap of the Moon" 113 13. The Contents of the Paschal Cycle 114 14. The Formulas for the Headings of the Paschal Table 115 15. The Sacrament of the Easter Season 116 16. The Ages of the World 117 17. The Sequence and Order of Times 118 18. The Second Age 119 19. The Third Age 120 20. The Fourth Age 122 21. The Fifth Age 124 22. The Sixth Age 126 Commentaries Commentary: On the Nature of Things 135 Commentary: On Times 166 Appendices Appendix 1: Bede: "A Hymn on the Work of the First Six Days and the Six Ages of the World" 180 Appendix 2: An Excursus on Bede's Mathematical Reasoning 186 Appendix 3: Bede's Calculation of Tidal Periods and the Purported "Immaturity" of "On the Nature of Things" 188 Appendix 4: Bede and Lucretius 191 Select Bibliography 193 Index of Sources and Parallels 206 General Index 212 ILLUSTRATIONS Schematic Model of Bede's Cosmos 134 Horologium 144 The Venerable Bede composed On the Nature of Things and On Times at the outset of his career in AD 703, shaping a mass of difficult and sometimes dangerous material on the mathematical and physical basis of time into a lucid and well-organized account that laid the framework for much of Carolingian and Scholastic scientific thought. Available here for the first time in English-language translation for the first time, these two short works represent an attempt to show Christianity connecting coherently with natural history and vice versa. Building on insights found in Isidore of Sevilles earlier work of the same name, On the Nature of Things addresses creation and recapitulates the idea of the four elements. In On Times , Bede breaks from Sevilles structure, separating out and considering the chapters on time. This work also introduces Bedes computus the practical yet intensely polemical science for determining the dates of Easter. Bedes views are bound up with the integrity of nature as Gods creation and the theological significance of Christs death and resurrection, and these extensively annotated translations mark an essential contribution to the ecclesiastical history that is crucial to an understanding of early medieval science. Translated here for the first time into English, Bede’s On the Nature of Things and On Times bring together cosmology and time-reckoning to form a unified science of computus —— the basis for the scientific education of the Middle Ages. Translated By Calvin B. Kendall, Faith Wallis. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [193]-205) And Indexes.